Captivity

Seems like only yesterday, the streets of Hollywood were filled with billboards depicting a grizzled old Samuel Jackson holding scantily-clad Christina Ricci on a big, chain leash. Little did we suspect from the controversial ad campaign that BLACK SNAKE MOAN was sappy Sundance fare to the core, more LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE than MANDINGO. Oh well, I’m sure those ubiquitous softcore billboards caused Dov Charney to run a few stop signs.

Time to make way for the latest sadomasochistic Hollywood ad campaign! Even by my depraved standards, the billboards for CAPTIVITY are way over the top! As reported in yesterday’s LA Times:

The ad consisted of four panels:

Abduction, in which a terrified young blond woman has either a gloved or black hand over her face, as if she’s being kidnapped.

Confinement, in which she’s behind a chain-link fence and appears to be poking a bloody thumb through the fence.

Torture, in which she is flat on her back, her face in a white cast, with red tubes that resemble jumper cables running into her nostrils.

And Termination, in which her head dangles over the edge of a table, the murder complete.

I wonder how the MPAA gave a pass to the CAPTIVITY billboards, but blocked last year’s much milder ROAD TO GUANTANAMO poster? Was it an act of political censorship? And what to make of the fact that CAPTIVITY is directed by leftist Roland Joffe (THE KILLING FIELDS) and scribed by Larry Cohen, the master of socially-relevant schlock? Willl CAPTIVITY have a Gitmo/Abu Ghraib subtext? Or will it be just another bad SAW clone?

Whatever the answer, Lionsgate has pissed off a lot of parents. The studio is scrambling to remove the offending billboards by tomorrow. So if you haven’t seen them yet, go out and take a gander at the most brazen marketing gimmick since Vincent Gallo got a hummer (little “h”) on Sunset Boulevard.

Perhaps it goes without saying that this poster for HOSTEL 2 doesn’t stand a chance of finding its way onto the bus shelters of Babylon.